Tuesday, 22 January 2013

A good run of depression-free months
comes to an abrupt end today and the next 3 months at the very least
I will be going to hell and back. While its the same old story with
the same trigger for this episode (continuous and unrelenting stress)
there is something different this time, 2 things in fact, I have a
full time job to cope with and the fact that going into this I have
never felt so alone and isolated in all my life.

I feel so disconnected with my closest
friends right now, they have their own things to be dealing with and
I can do nothing but 'be there for them' but despite a telephone call
to a counsellor who tried to reassure me its all I can do and as I’m
doing it I'm doing everything I can do, I felt screaming at her ITS
NOT ENOUGH!! I didn't though it just didn't help to hear it from
someone else, after all I know this and I have to come peace with it
but I can't, in fact I won't.

Compounding this new episode is I’m
also almost delirious with raging temperature (I’m heating up the
room better than my radiator, not that difficult at all mind you) my
vision is blurry, I’m dizzy and full of cold, yet in all likeliness
I will have to go to work tomorrow (I really don't want to) however
given my employer's sickness policy I got one more free day where I
can take a sick day, any more before April and I’ll be pulled up on
a disciplinary, now given I have mental health issues any official
record of me taking sick days isn't going to look good especially
when it comes to idiots who decide that those of us with mental
health issues are really just skivers (and some employers do think
this way and discriminate accordingly).

A big thank you to John
for commentating on my previous post, means a lot I really mean that
just hope this isn't too much of a downer for you. Derbiean will go
marching on regardless of everything and fight the depression, after
all what else I can do anyway?

Thursday, 17 January 2013

The only thing I find more difficult than my own suffering is to see the suffering of another,
especially of those closest to me. Right now there are three who are
going through bad times (and another who is suicidal) while I am
there for them it feels as though I’m watching from afar as they go
through it whilst i look on helplessly, powerless to affect the
circumstances, beyond being there for someone what can one actually
do?

Nothing and I hate that
more than anything.

Being there for them just
isn't enough I have to offer some worthwhile piece of advice or
insight that helps the circumstances surrounding them or their
current emotional state, I never manage to it seems, part of me says
its because there is nothing to said or done beyond being there, the
other part says its because I’m actually not that good of a friend
I’ve been so wrapped up in my own problems over the years I
actually have no clue how to help anyone else, I mean how could I? I
couldn't help myself most of the time.

Quite often they tell me
of what is going on (or not going on that should be) for them and a
lot of the time lately I’m wondering on what I can actually say,
often nothing comes to mind other than “thats crap” “thats not
right” “im so sorry to hear to that” etc and I keep saying to
myself “thats all you can say? A bog standard go to response?”

Often mental health
professionals asked me why it is so important to me that I’d often
allow it to consume me to the point I was a emotional wreck, I’d
say it's because I care about these people, I know what its like
(sometimes) to go through what they are going through, one of the
four said its because I am a 'glutton for punishment' and the fact I
can conveniently forget about my own troubles and avoid having to
deal with my own things.

I still have to figure out
how to cope with seeing others struggle and accept the awful fact
that often there is little or nothing I can do about it, how I manage
this will be subject of much intense introspection for a very long
time to come.